Growing up, Saturday was laundry and cleaning day in my home (samdi jou bese leve); and since everyone was busy doing some chores, on that day an easy dish was required for the kids. One of the reoccurring recipes was spaghetti with herring (spaghetti ak aransò). I remember as a kid, I hated smoked herring. Now, I can’t seem to eat it enough. I highly recommend this recipe is you want a kreyòl taste.
Life is about exploring the pasta-bilities
Ingredients:
12 oz of dry spaghetti
5 smoked herring fillets
1 onion
1 head of garlic
1 habanero pepper
3 green onions
2 tomatoes
1 bell pepper
1/3 cup of fresh parsley
1/4 cup of fresh thyme
6 oz of evaporated milk
salt to taste (1 tbsp to boil the pasta)
6 oz of tomato sauce
Let’s get started!!
The first thing to do is to cook the pasta. In a large pot of water on high heat, add one tablespoon of salt (I am using sea salt) and let it come to a boil. When it starts to boil, add the pasta and cook it based on the package’s instructions. When it reaches the al dente state, drain it; and make sure not to rinse it.
In the meantime, start preparing the produce ingredients. Usually people soak the herrings an hour before so most of the salt can come off; but for this recipe I am not doing that. I simply rinse off the herring so that the surface salt can come off and don’t add any additional salt to the dish. Take 2 herring fillets and mash them in a pilon/motar or simply use a food processor to do that. The other 3 herring fillets, simply dice them.
After that, it’s time to make the “epis”. Put the peeled garlic cloves, the scallions, parsley, habanero pepper and thyme and use the pilon/motar to mash them. For the thyme, I try to not use the hard spring, only the leaves. If you think a whole habanero pepper is too hot, simply use half. I added a little salt to my “epis”, while keeping in mind that the herring is salty. If you are not sure, just don’t add any salt. After that, dice the tomatoes, onion and bell pepper. And let’s go to the cooking process.
In a large pot on medium heat, add oil and let it warm up. Once the oil is hot enough, add both the mashed herring and the diced herring, and let them cook for two minutes. After that, add the diced onion and let it cook for one minute. After that, add the diced bell pepper and let cook also for one minute. Add the “epis”, mix it in and let it cook for one minute so that the flavors can come together. Add the diced tomatoes, milk and tomato sauce and let them cook for one minute, and then you’ll be ready to add the pasta.
When you put the spaghetti in the sauce, make sure to mix it in well so that the sauce can coat each spaghetti strand. When mixing spaghetti, don’t use a spoon; use either a big fork or tongues. Once the spaghetti is mixed really well, cover it lower the flame and let it cook for a good 2-3 minutes, and then you can turn off the heat.
Enjoy
Thank you for time